"Form squares!" bellowed Conn in his loudest voice. "Infantry, form squares and fight for your lives, until our enemies break upon your spears and shields!"
Conn gave the order as he stood in the centre of his army, surrounded on all sides by the Black Dragons. Surrounding them were an inner screen of Bossonians, who had fallen back from renewed assaults by the Kushites and Stygians.
The shattered remnants of the Aquilonian heavy cavalry stood beyond the inner circle, arrayed about and seeking to restore order in their ranks after suffering decimation from the hidden traps prepared for them, the volleys of the Brythunian archers and their compound bows, and the follow-up assaults of the Nemedian heavy infantry whose regiments had long experience at combat against their Aquilonian foes. Conn had judged they needed time to regroup and draw breath, before unleashing them for another desperate push against their foes.
On the outer flanks of these inner circles stood he surviving infantry, both Aquilonian and auxiliary, now forming themselves into compact squares, each bristling with spears and pikes along its outer margin while its interior was covered in the overlapping shields of the soldiers. It was a last-ditch maneuver of final defence, which if unsuccessful presaged either envelopment and destruction of Conn's forces, or else a humiliating retreat from the field of battle with the enemy hot on their heels.
Surrounding Conan's beleaguered army as the sun began to sink towards the west, and the shadows of late afternoon began to lengthen, were a host of enemies on all flanks. To the west they faced the Shemite cavalary, making repeated false charges and sudden retreats in an effort to wear down the nerve of their stationary foes while minimizing their own casualties. To the north they were pressed on steadily by the Corinthian auxiliaries, aided by Brythunian bowmen. To the east they faced the Nemedian heavy infantry head on. To the south they faced the regrouped forces of the Stygians - now dismounted from their bogged-down chariots and fighting on foot - and their Kushite allies. And here and there about the field they were harassed by fleeting parties of Zamorians, who would appear out of their pre-laid traps in the ground to cause havoc, only to disappear just as swiftly - when their enraged foes did not manage to slaughter all of these lightly-armoured skirmishers first.
Conn reflected bitterly on how events had turned from bad to worse over the course of the day, as his counterattacks against the Shemite cavalry faltered before their bafflingly unfamiliar and ever-shifting tactics, while his own Aquilonian cavalry had flailed disastrously in extricating itself from the traps that were laid for it under constant volleys from the Brythunian archers and assaults from the Nemedian infantry. Now he had to choice but to hold out until sunset, after which, unless he somehow managed to turn the tide in the interim, he would have no choice but to attempt a breakout and beat a hurried retreat north under cover of darkness towards the Kothite frontier. That his auxiliary forces would be loath to risk themselves further in the aid of a defeated Aquilonian army, and that more than one Aquilonian pretender to the throne would likey rise to challenge his rule again were thoughts which weighed heavily on the back of Conn's mind, though he had more pressing affairs to concern himself with at present.
So the battle raged on under as the sun sank lower in the west, and began to grow larger and redder with the approaching sunset - though it seemed to all the men present on the field, in what few spare moments they could glimpse to look at it, that the entire western sky had begun to glow an angry red tone that was almost unnatural, though the skeptically minded deemed it on account of all the dust which had been thrown up into the air during the day's battle.
As he surveyed the carnage from atop the back of his steed, Conn noticed a stranger sight still - a brilliant white orb or crescent of light which sprang up suddenly to the west, by the distant margins of the Shemite cavalry. Even from afar, Conn could hear cries of alarm - and what sounded like screams of agony and fear - from the pressing hordes of Shemite cavalry. These of a sudden pulled back from the battlefield in another retreat, which Conn first thought to be once again feigned. But as they regrouped towards the western horizon, under a sky grown red as blood to the west and steadily nigh as black as pitch above - a strange thing in a dry and normally cloudless land - they careened off as if in desperate flight for their lives towards the north and east, disappearing from sight after the passage of some minutes with no sign of their return, in spite of trumpets and drums from the Stygian forces which seemed intent on recalling them.
Noting to his surprise but great relief that the entire western flank of his besieged army was now free and clear of foes, Conn at once took advantage of the opportunity to sound a general retreat towards the western shore, if only to regroup and resume the fight on the morrow. While the thought that this was another trap passed his mind, he soon dismissed it - the retreat of the Shemites was too sudden and disorderly to be feigned, and their withdrawal so rapid that they could not hope to flank Conn's forces from the west again without giving him ample warning of their intentions. This combined with the bogging-down of the Stygian chariots had left his foes with no forces who could hope to close the gap and resume his encirclement quickly.
"It seems events are turning in our favour, for once," opined Conn to one of his Black Dragons, the young lieutenant whom he had spoken through earlier in the day upon the sudden assault of the Zamorian assassins. "Perhaps the gods now look up me with favour."
"There is something unnatural about all this, your majesty," replied the young man with a frown as he edged his charger forward alongside Conn's. "I've never seen a light as bright as that before, which it seemed put he fear of all gods and devils in the Shemetish riders - did you see how fast they fled in retreat, like the wind itself? And I've never seen a sunset like this one either, for that matter."
"I know not the cause of that strange light," replied Conn," though surely this red sky is just on account of the dust in the air."
"And what accounts for the blackness of the night sky, with no clouds to be seen all day and the sun not yet set fully either?" asked the young lieutenant. Conn shrugged his broad shoulders in reply, though he felt the trace of a chill up his spine - no doubt the result of his half-Cimmerian heritage of superstitious fear at anything outside the norm.
Turning his mind to his more urgent tactical responsibilities, Conn issued commands to and received messages from his varied forces, as they slowly began a fighting withdrawal towards the broad gap in his enemy's that had suddenly opened towards their west. The Kushites and Stygians to the south and the Corinthians and Brythunians to the north tried to outflank them though, as Conn predicted, they had not the speed to move more quickly than their foes and close the gap before them.
Conn was contemplating whether he should order a sudden breakout by his surviving cavalry to spearhead their orderly retreat to the shore, when suddenly his steed stopped dead in his tracks as a flash of light immediately before him almost blinded him!
As his Black Dragons swore with shock and alarm, suspecting another surprise attack by their stealthy Zamorian foes, Conn took in the bizarre figure who stood in front of him. Tall, young and muscular, with the unmistakable features of a Cimmerian hillman, he was clad in the most alien and outlandish garb Conn had ever seen; a mix of garish feathers, golden baubles, beads, and strange fabrics woven with stranger geometric shapes, all torn, stained and matted as if their owner had weathered the harshest deserts and worst storms imaginable for months on end. The dark blue eyes in the stranger's sun-bronzed, youthful face glared meaningfully at Conn, setting off a strange sensation at the back of his skull, though he was sure he had never seen this barbarian outlander before in his quarter-century of years under the sun.
More disturbingly, in his right hand this stranger grasped a staff on which was mounted a skull of human size and proportions, carved it seemed from crystal, and glowing with it own clear inner light - an unmistakeable sign of witchcraft marking the giant outlander before him as a practitioner of the dark arts, as far as Conn was concerned.
"Don't stand there with your mouth hanging open!" said the man in a deep, stentorian voice, and Conn's blood ran cold as he recognized its familiarity. "It seems I have returned to you just in time!"
"How dares this mage address our king so?" asked the lieutenant who rode alongside Conn, as he and the Black Dragons shifted their swords into a combat stance. But Conn gestured to them to sheath their swords, saying "Harm him not! Give him a horse, so that he may ride alongside me, and then fall back from us. I would have words with him alone, as we press forward"
"As you command, my liege," replied the lieutenant doubtfully, "though I beg you to have a care. This man looks wild and dangerous to me, and it seems he is in league with the dark powers - see how unnaturally glows the crystal bauble affixed to his staff!"
"At least one of the Black Dragons has something of value between his ears," replied the man, speaking Aquilonian with a strange accent, almost Cimmerian though distorted in a manner they had never heard before. "But I think your king can see I mean him no harm. I am here to aid him in his hour of need."
"Do as I have commanded without delay!" snapped Conn, worried that his sudden halt might soon bring his entire army to halt their march, frustrating their retreat to the coast. Recognizing the urgency is his voice, one of the mounted Black Dragons dismounted his steed and cautiously led it by its reins towards the man, resting his other hand warily on the hilt of his sword. The man took the beast by its reins and mounted with a surprisingly swift and practiced move, as the guardsman feel back into the ranks of those of his fellows who fought on foot.
Conn gave the order to continue their march forward, and then fell in beside the mounted stranger as the Black Dragons drew apart - though yet close enough that they could swiftly ride to their king's aid, if the need presented itself.
"You speak in my father's voice, and your eyes are the same," whispered Conn so that only the man could hear, "and yet surely you cannot be him! He would have well nigh three-score and a dozen winters under his belt now, and yet you look barely more than a score of winters old, younger even than me! What strange sorcery is this?"
"Not for one moment do I blame your doubts, which I would share were I in your place," replied he,"but it is I, Conan, your father,in the flesh."
"And how can I take you at your word for such an outlandish claim?" replied Conn.
"Do you not recall when we spoke from afar, by way of our images cast from the mirrors into which we gazed?"
"Aye, but then you - or my father - was an old man, as was natural, however unnatural it was to speak to him in that fashion. I am to believe that some magic unheard of has stripped away from you the veil of years, and restored you to your youth? For my father was two score and six years old when I was born, and never did i know him in his youthful prime."
"That is exactly the case," was the grave reply, "though I can scarcely believe myself what has happened. But while there is little time to explain all now, you will recall when last we spoke albeit from afar, I warned you that we were caught up in a net stretching into the heavens and the deeps. There is a great struggle between forces beyond our ken, using us it seems as their pawns - though ill I like that position, and by Crom and Mitra I hope to be rid of it soon!"
"Yet still," replied Conn, "I cannot accept that such a thing can be, or that you are in truth my father and not some mage in his youthful guise, unless you give me clearer proof."
"Then what proof do you require?" asked the man, with some impatience in his tone. "We have little time to talk, nor am I in fit mood for it, and soon the hour of doom and time for action will be at hand."
"Tell me something about me that surely no one else would know, not even a mage," replied Conn sagely.
"It is a long time since you were but a bairn," replied the man, "but still - do you recall the time when you sprang up from your bath, and ran naked into the gardens, where the Priests of Mitra were conducting a blessing ceremony, and you screamed out loud that…"
"Yes," replied Conn stiffly, "though that story was well known for a time - if rarely repeated today."
"Then there was that time when your mother found you right there in her powder room, looking through all the pastes and potions she used to apply to herself, and you asked her why you…"
"Enough!" cried Conn. "Not a soul knows that story, other than my late mother, and.."
"And your father, whelp!" replied the man with a savage grin.
"Then it is you, father!" replied Conn, his eyes opening wide, as the sudden realization of the truth shot through his body like a bolt of lightening.
"Aye, that's what I've been trying to tell you!" nodded Conan.
"And yet how is any of this possible?" marvelled Conn. "That you have turned back the ravages of time against your body, or that you have crossed the countless leagues of the Western Ocean so swiftly since we last spoke, from the fabulous lands of the sunset to the shores of Shem?"
"None of it by my doing," replied Conan darkly. "The tale is too long to tell you now in full - I will do so some other time, if we survive the events of this day! But I will tell you what you need to know now, so that you understand what awaits us."
And briefly Conan related to Conn the struggle between Kuthlan and Set, the pivotal role of the Crystal Skull in the battle between them for supremacy, and how Kuthlan had made alliance with Conan - for the moment - rejuvenating him through the waters of the fountain of youth so as to better endure the rigours to come - and speeding him across the ocean on the back of a monstrous Kraken, which tarried only to destroy the Stygian fleet it encountered just off the coast of Shem.
"A Stygian fleet!" exclaimed Conn, his brown eyes widening. "What treacherous curs! They lured us to this battlefield, mined with traps, and then sought to lure us to the shore, only to plan to employ their fleet and the soldiers on it against us at the shore as a final hammer blow!"
"Perhaps that was their plan," shrugged Conan, "though I am the one who dispersed the hounds of Shem - at least by way of a demonstration of the power of this bauble." He nodded towards the Crystal Skull, which still glowed brightly, to Conn's lingering unease.
"Then what awaits us now?" asked Conn. "Apart from the obvious - an entrenchment by the seashore guarding our back, and a siege by the enemy at dawn? Unless your Crystal Skull can turn the same trick with the Stygians, Nemedians and their allies that it did with the Shemites and drive them howling into the wilderness."
"Alas, I have never controlled its power," replied Conan grimly. "Your father is no mage, regardless of how things may appear to you or your men. But I fear a greater foe awaits us than those of the field of battle. Though I have not a precise count of days, it is nigh on a dozen years since I made my fateful bargain with Set - looking at the blood run sky and in the west, and the unnatural ebon sky above, and feeling the promptings of my heart - or perhaps the silent whisperings of the Skull in my ear - I feel in my bones that the hour of doom is upon us."
"And what will you do when it is, father?" asked Conn.
"That I would not tell you, even if I knew," replied Conan, with unusual discretion. "For if I speak my mind aloud then Set may hear, to the ruin of us all."
"Shall I not at least tell our knights and soldiers of your return?" asked Conn more hopefully - so great was the turmoil of his spirit that this thought had only now occurred to him. "Such good news would give them hope unlooked for in their hour of trial."
"No!" replied Conan sternly. "For one thing, if you doubted me at first, how grave do you think their doubts will be? For there are few members of your Dragon Guard who would have been in service to the Lion Throne when I gave up my crown to sail into the west; and surely, there is no man left alive in Hyboria today who knew me in my youth. They would all think you had lost your mind, and you would be discredited before their eyes both as commander in the field of battle and as king."
"And as to the latter," Conan continued, "if they did believe you then what would happen? Would they seek to reinstate me on the throne? I would not wish it, nor should you, for Aquilonia is now yours and yours alone to rule. Whatever happens this night, of one thing am I sure - never again will I king it in Aquilonia, or any other land!"
"Perhaps you still have the wisdom of a greybeard, in spite of once again having the body of a youth," mused Conn. "Yet it is maddening to know the truth of this miracle, and be silent concerning it!"
"That is the least of your concerns!" replied Conan, his voice hoarse and tight now as he suddenly drew the reins of his steed to a halt. "Look!"
He gestured towards the blood-red sky to the west, where it met the ebon vault above. Conn's own steed now came to a halt of its own accord, as all the men of all the hosts assembled on both sides stilled their march to gaze in mixed awe and fear at the sight in the heavens above.
As lightning began to arc along the boundary between the crimson glare of the setting sun and the ebon vault of the sky above, a sphere black as jet and broad as the moon appeared suddenly just above the horizon. Howling winds surged forth out of the sphere, leading to a sudden halt to the march of all the armies on the field, and cries of alarm and fear from countless men present - save the Stygians and Kushites alone, who dropped their spears and shields and dropped to the ground where they stood, prostrating themselves in an attitude of worship as they began to chant in deep, monotonous voices in their own cryptical tongue.
"By Mitra!" exclaimed Conn, as his steed neighed and pawed the ground nervously and he struggled to keep it in check. "What in heaven's name is that?"
"It's not Mitra and surely not from heaven," replied Conan tersely, dismounting his own panicked steed as Conn noted that the mysterious Crystal Skull which he bore glowed more brightly than ever, leading to further cries of alarm and suspicion from the Black Dragons nearby. "I deem the hour of fulfilment of my bargain with the old serpent himself is at hand!"
"Set!" exclaimed Conn in shock and horror. And even as he spoke the dreaded name, revered by the Stygians and feared by the Hyborians in equal measure, a dim stirring of shape and form could be seen within the sphere, even darker as if it were not merely the absence of light, but a tangible thing which absorbed and extinguished all light within itself.
Conan's awareness of all about him dimmed as the armies of men, and even the nearby shape of his own son, were obscured in gloom and their cries dimmed and silenced, while within the curling columns that drifted out of the portal two glowing red embers took shape. But this time Conan well knew what stood before him - the writhing, crimson-eyed avatar of Set himself!
"At last the hour has come, Conan of Cimmeria!" gloated Set, his red eyes glaring balefully. "I see that you have obtained one benefit at least from your treason and dealings with my foe - renewed youthfulness of your mortal frame. I trust you put this to good use during the brief time you could enjoy it, for I promise you that you will pay a heavy price for your treachery!"
"You are the father of lies and treachery, and yet I do not fear you!" shot back Conan defiantly.
"Then you are even more stupid than I had imagined," hissed Set, his slanted red eyes narrowing as he bared his ivory-white fangs, dripping with smoking ichor. "But I will not bandy further words with you, mortal. All you have done is in vain and now you have reached the moment of reckoning. I have fulfilled my pact with you, and you will fulfil your pact with me. Give me the Crystal Skull, now!"
Conan felt his right arm moving by a power greater than his own will - though whether it was by the will of Set, or some immutable law of the universe Conan had put in motion through his pact, he could not tell. As if he were a puppet whose strings were pulled by an invisible master, and despite exerting every ounce of his willpower to the contrary, Conan helplessly held up the staff to which the Crystal Skull was affixed, offering it up to Set's scaly grasp.
To Conan's amazement, the wooden staff suddenly crumbed to ash in his hands and blew away as dust in the wind, yet the Crystal Skull, glowing now more brightly than ever before, was suspended in the air, seemingly in a final manifestation of its own innate power.
Black, snaky tendrils descended down from the portal, as Set reached out to finally claim the great prize he had long sought, and Conan's mind raced desperately as for the first time in his long life he faced what seemed a final and absolute defeat. For all Kuthlan's aid to him, he feared that to call upon the aid of Kuthlan and offer up the Crystal Skull even now to that demon of the deeps, before Set to seize it for himself, would merely be to jump from the frying pan into the fire.
Conan was alone, and now that the moment of truth was at hand he still had no idea what he could do to cheat Set of what he had promised to him without unleashing the monstrous evil of Kuthlan.
Suddenly, the realization came into Conan's mind that there was nothing he could do - nothing at all. His role as a pawn in the game of the gods was at an end, and whatever fate had in store now, it was beyond his power and strength to shape the final outcome.
Feeling strangely calm at this intuition - when in his youth, he would have felt exactly the opposite - Conan threw up his arms, and cried out in his deep, stentorian voice, "Spirit within the Skull, I am bound my my own bargains, but you are not. Choose yourself whom you will serve – Set, Kuthlan, or your own will above all!"
Set laughed darkly at this futile gesture by the doomed mortal before him, when his prize was almost within his grasp. But then his laughter ceased suddenly, and his glowing crimson eyes opened widely, as the Skull began to shimmer and vibrate, an ominous humming sound issuing forth from it growing louder each passing second. It seemed Conan had not uttered his final words to the Crystal Skull in vain.
There was a sudden flash of white light, and then Conan and his demonic foe both gasped aloud - for before them now hovered not one, but three Crystal Skulls, each identical to the other! These began to spin around and around an unseen axis, faster and faster, swapping places fast than the eye could see, until their movements came into a sudden stop, and the three identical skulls, glowing brightly, stood suspended in the air as Set's smoky tendrils flitted about, approaching but not yet seizing any of them in their grasp.
Then a voice issued forth from each of the three Crystal Skulls deep and clear, echoing as it was repeated between them:
"Conan of Cimmeria has fulfilled his bargain, Set! Now choose, and chose wisely. For one of these skulls is genuine, and the others are counterfeit! Choose poorly, and your own bargain shall be voided by your own actions, with the true Crystal Skull and its power shall be forever beyond your scaly grasp!"
"What is this outrage!" boomed Set, his wrath so palpable as to cause the hairs on Conan's skin to stand on end.
"It is not my doing, in spite of my words," replied Conan as evenly as he could, given the dire peril in which he found himself.
"And yet you will pay for it, when I have my trophy!" hissed Set venomously. "You will suffer the tortures of the damned a thousand fold!"
Without further word to the Cimmerian, Set then turned his crimson gaze fully upon the three glowing skulls hovering before him.
"I see now, Sprit of the Skull, that you were no common sorcerer amongst mortal men, imbued with the power of my foe!" Set exclaimed directly to the skulls, his eyes widening. "You heated my foe ages ago, deceiving him into surrendering the great bulk of his power into your own mortal frame, and then using that power to render yourself into your presented form. But you will not outwit me, nor cheat me of my due!"
Smoky tendrils once again shot forth from from the portal and writhed sinuously around the skulls, as if trying to sense some unseen emanation from them, while carefully avoiding touching them.
"Enough of these conjuror's tricks!" exclaimed Set at length - seemingly unable to choose. "I will have them all, without now choosing any of them as the true Crystal Skull in fulfilment of the pact!" And the smoking tendrils all shot forth at once, seizing the skulls and drawing them back into the portal from whence Set had come.
"There is no time in the void!" laughed Set triumphantly as his sinuous form began to withdraw into the portal. "If it take me a thousand thousand mortal years of this planet, I will learn which of these is the genuine Crystal Skull - but to you, Cimmerian, it will seem but a moment has elapsed! Then I shall deal with you at my leisure, before I turn my attention to aiding my mortal followers in sweeping your son's armies into the sea, and your son himself into the void along with you!"
"By Crom and Mitra, you shall not!" bellowed Conan with rage - and yet uselessly, for he knew how useless were his words and even the limit of his deeds before the unleashed power of a hostile god, now that all of his devices and strategems were at an end.
"Crom answers not the prayers of Men," came forth the voice of Crystal Skull from all three of its copies. "But Mitra may yet do so!"
"No! It cannot be!" hissed Set, and Conan realized that even his deep, inhuman voice was tinged with fear. "The Elder Gods have departed from this plane, never to return!"
"You have chosen poorly," replied the Spirit of the Skull to Set. "Now you will pay the price - for the Crystal Skull and its power shall be lost to you forever!"
"NOOO!" screamed Set in a shrill voice, as the three skulls glowed more brightly than mortal eyes could bear, spinning faster and faster even as the smoking tendrils had almost drawn them through the portal into the void from which Set had come forth. As Conan stared in amazement, there was a blinding explosion of light as each of the three skulls shot forth from Set's grasp, only to each fly off at tremendous speed in its own direction as if they were shooting stars - towards the sky, the earth, and the sea, all soon vanishing at lightening speed far beyond his sight.
Set, meanwhile, was drawn back inside the portal, seemingly unable to continue his manifestation on the material plane now that the Crystal Skull had cheated him of his due, and left him shorn of its power when almost within his grasp.
"CURSE YOU, CONAN OF CIMMERIA!" boomed Set, his crimson eyes ablaze with rage and hatred against his mortal foe. "Should you be reborn a hundred times, still I will remember your treachery, and hunt you to your doom!"
The portal suddenly snapped shut and disappeared, Set's hateful visage withdrawing from Conan's sight for the last time - or so he hoped.
But then the crimson glare of the sunset - if such indeed it was, for Conan could sense nothing else about him, and feared he had somehow been removed from the material realm onto the astral plane - shimmered and quavered strangely, shifting colour from deep red to brilliant green, and then a deepening blue that was almost black, though still tinged with a sickly greenish hue. Conan felt a mounting sense of pressure all about, and began to breath with difficulty, as if he were no longer surrounded by the air, but by some crushing invisible force or pressure whose nature he could only guess at.
The hard ground began to dissolve beneath Conan's feet, which sank into the mire. Strange dark shapes then began to loom before Conan's eyes, and he realized with a chill down his spine that this grim place was not unknown to him. He had been here before, long before, if only in a dream.
The faint, unearthly glow of towers and temples, steps and streets, all set at impossible angles and twisted into impossible shapes, now appeared more clearly before Conan's troubled eyes, amid the shimmering of deep waters - the sunken city of Kuthlan himself!
"Out of the frying pan, and into the fire," whispered Conan under his breath.
To his surprise, a glowing object slowly descended from the darkness above, gradually sinking onto the surface of the mire - the Crystal Skull! Or at least, Conan realized, one of its counterfeits, for even he, who had kept the Skull in his possession for a dozen years, could not tell the genuine article from its identical imposters.
Two of the great, bizarrely-shaped and hideously-carved doors to one of the massive edifices on the side of the sunken city closest to Conan now began to open slowly, a shimmering greenish hue issuing forth from them in trails of greenish vapour as the unseen occupant within stirred to life. Conan braced himself even as his blood ran cold, for he realized that he now faced the second of the two dark powers who had used him as a pawn for the past dozen years, and feared its full revelation of its presence in its own domain would be far more terrible than the partial and tenuous image he had glimpsed in the crystal mirror of the fountain of youth.
Two slanted, glowing amber ovals suddenly appear in the dark chamber once shielded by the doors, and Conan felt the icy hand of fear grip his spine as once again, as in his dream, he stared into the eyes of Kuthlan - for as at that time, he sense in Kuthlan a presence more alien and incomprehensible to the mind of man than Set, whose will to power matched that of men them selves, and whose chosen avatar at least was that of a beast, the serpent, whom men knew, even if loathed by them.
Conan's silent wish that Kuthlan would not come forth from his lair was dashed immediately, as the vast bulk of Kuthlan surged forth into the waters between them. Conan was petrified with horror beyond the imagining of the thousand generations of superstitious Cimmerian mountaineers from whom he was descended at the indescribable sight before him - a colossal, flailing mass of tentacles, feelers, taloned claws, scaly wings, and a vast pulsating, bulbous head to which those hideous amber eyes were affixed. A vertical slit appeared between and below the eyes, opening to reveal thousands of hideously sharp, serrated teeth guarding the maw of the hideous being.
Conan could not even find the words in any language known to him to describe the true appearance, the horror of Kuthlan - it was simply beyond the mind of man, and Conan could not fathom how his own mortal mind maintained its sanity when faced with this utterly alien and inhuman presence. If Set was a dark entity spawned in the pits of Hell, evil shaped by order and desiring to twist all things to its black desire, then Kuthlan was the embodiment of the seething, formless nothingness before there ever was a Hell, evil chaotic and unbridled.
"So in spite of disregarding my command to offer up the Crystal Skull to me, you have cheated Set of his due, even as his prize was within his grasp!" rumbled Kuthlan in a deep yet hollow voice, as if muffled by the watery depths which separated them. "I always knew the Crystal Skull would never serve Set at the hour of doom, though Set's greed blinded him to the truth. He has surely spent much of his power in his futile attempt seize it for himself, and it will be eons before he can manifest in the material plane again. I am well-pleased, and doubly so that you have delivered the Crystal Skull to me!"
As Conan stared back in horror, Kuthlan continued to speak: "In spite of your treachery, Conan of Cimmeria, the Crystal Skull has sought me out. How could it be otherwise, when it embodies so much of my own power? Now it shall be mine, and absorbing its power within myself, mine own shall wax to the full! At last I shall be freed from this watery tomb, to raven and slay and delight in this and many other worlds, without Set the Accursed to stand in my way with his paltry dreams of dominion!"
"Then all along you used me as your pawn, so that the world could fall into your grasp, rather than that of Set?" Conan asked grimly, mustering up the courage to speak.
"Did you expect otherwise, mortal fool?" asked Kuthlan, as one of his tentacles, layered with suction cups like that of the Kraken, surged forth towards the Crystal Skull. "And thanks to the gift of youth I have given you, you will have many long years to savour the bitter fruit of your labours! It is the least punishment you deserve, for you have never numbered amongst my mortal servants in truth, serving always your own feeble will in place of my desires!"
"How do you know for a certainty the Crystal Skull before you is the genuine one?" asked Conan suddenly, in a stroke of guile surprising even himself. "I deem you saw and heard what happened from afar, here in your watery lair. The Crystal Skull will not readily surrender its power to the dark. Choose poorly, grasping a counterfeit, and surely you will remain condemned in your watery tomb forever, just as Set has failed to escape his prison in the Void!"
Kuthlan's eyes flashed brightly with a greenish glow as his tentacles stopped short suddenly, just shy of the Crystal Skull. The monstrous being then turned its gaze towards the Skull directly, though unlike Set his eyes neither grew larger nor narrowed under the burden of any emotion recognizable to men.
"It might have been better for you and your world had you said nothing, so great was my eagerness to claim the Skull and its power for myself, even at the risk of repeating Set's folly," exclaimed Kuthlan, turning his unbearable gaze on Conan once again. "But unlike Set, I am patient. I can wait! If it takes twelve-thousand years for me to unravel this puzzle, so long shall I wait, until I have recovered all copies of the Crystal Skull, and am certain my choice is the right one. Then let the world tremble!"
"And as for you, Conan of Cimmeria," continued Kuthlan, "though it is within my power to crush you like the lowest insect, yet I will not do so. Instead I will offer you a parting gift of wisdom. For mortal men, life on the material plane is not a gift, but a curse! You will rue the day I allowed you to drink from the waters of the fountain of youth with my blessing, and I shall laugh from afar as I witness your slow but certain ruin!"
And with that cryptical remark, the shambling bulk of Kuthlan withdrew swiftly inside his lair, the huge doors swung shut, and Conan found himself in ebon darkness, save for the clear light of the Crystal Skull which still stood before him when all else had faded from sight.
The Skull fixed its empty gaze on Conan, and as the light within shone more and more brightly, it expanded into a growing sphere of light which pushed back the all-encompassing dark, until it was beyond the limits of Conan's vision. The sense of pressure on his chest eased, he found he could breathe once more, and his feet no longer stood on any type of surface - rather it seemed he floated weightlessly in a timeless realm of pure, clear light, which gave him a sense of calm and peace he had never known in waking life throughout his long years on earth.
"Welcome, Conan of Cimmeria, to the Celestial Realm," intoned the Spirit of the Skull, as it spoke directly to Conan for the first time.
"I never thought that I of all men would enter Heaven!" exclaimed Conan, unsure of what else to say.
"Stranger things have happened," replied the Spirit
"Am I then dead at last?" asked Conan, unsure of whether to feel anxious or relieved.
"That is up to you," replied the Spirit. "Know, Conan, that this avatar I have taken, the Crystal Skull, is the transmuted remains of a Lemurian wizard who long ago betrayed Kuthlan - or Cuthulu, his true name - when he realized how vile was the evil that he served. But though a great portion of Cuthulu's power was contained within by the Lemurian's ruse against the dark god of the deeps - so much is known to you - the spirit of the Crystal Skull whose presence you have so often felt was never that of the Lemurian wizard himself! For he has long since passed into the realms beyond the physical world. I assumed control of the powers of the Crystal Skull in answer to the Lemurian's prayer as he died, though he knew me by another name than do you."
"Then who are you?" asked Conan simply.
"Can you not guess?" replied the Spirit. "Set himself recognized the presence of the Elder Gods within this form!"
"By Mitra..." exclaimed Conan...
"It avails you nought to swear by my name, when in my presence," replied Mitra - for so indeed it was!
"And then you have chosen the Crystal Skull as your avatar?" asked Conan, astounded.
"As a ruse against the powers of primal darkness," replied Mitra. "Though my true form, as far as mortal mind can comprehend, is light itself."
"Crom!" exclaimed Conan, at a loss for words.
"A dark god of the underworld," replied Mitra, with what Conan felt was a wave of disapproval. "Though not evil as are Set and Kuthlan, yet caring not for Men and their fate. It is strange and perverse your people have chosen him for your worship, though in your ferocious spirit of strife you are one of his true sons."
"I am what I am," replied Conan, not knowing what else to say in his defence. "But what did you mean earlier when I asked you if I was dead? I can choose what?"
"To remain here, in the Celestial Realms, and in the company of myself and other Elder Gods who shall hail you as a hero if you choose to remain," replied Mitra. "For you have restrained both Set and Cuthulu in the prisons in which they were long ago placed, frustrating and foiling their plans to escape, to tyrannize the world as Set had hoped, or consume it as Cuthulu had planned. Set has squandered so much of his power in his failed manifestation on the material plane that without the power of the Crystal Skull, he may never again be able to appear in your world, not for eons at least. And Cuthulu remains trapped in his watery tomb under deepest seas still shorn of much of his power of old. Neither of these dark gods will trouble the Earth again for this age of the world, the Hyborian Age, or many long years thereafter -thanks to Conan of Cimmeria!"
"It seems I would be the greatest fool ever to live not to accept your offer!" replied Conan. "And yet that means I shall be dead?"
"Life and death are points of view," answered Mitra. "But yes, if you chose to remain here then you will negate the unnatural youth conferred on you by the power of Cuthulu, your life on the material plane of your world will have come to an end, and you will have died saving it. Though all men save your son believe you to be dead, in any case, and he will know that you died to save your world. But the choice is yours to make, and make freely - I will not gainsay nor judge you if you wish to return to the realm of strife and struggle."
Conan pondered deeply, facing a choice he realized had perhaps never been offered to a man before, and perhaps never would be again.
After a time, he knew the choice he must make if he were true to himself.
"I should happily join the Celestial Realm, were that to be my fate," replied Conan. "But I cannot choose to join it and turn my back on the world of my own free will. Just as I did not turn back across the sea from my voyage to Antillia to retire to a rose garden in Poitain, though that would have been the easier choice for me. I am a son of Crom, as you yourself have said, and his spirt moves my blood - to fight and strive as long as life allows, until fate wrenches my spirit from my body at then end!"
Mitra was silent for some moments. Then he said, "If that is your choice, then so be it. There are those amongst my number who will deem you a fool, not to lay down your heavy burden when that is offered to you, and moreover having incurred the mortal enmity of both Set and Cuthulu! But, I do not think so. In your new life and youthful form you will once more play a role in our struggle against the primal powers of chaos and the void. Your choice then is yours because you are a true champion of men!"
"So you have willed that you return to the material plane, and so it shall be done," concluded Mitra. And without further word, the Crystal Skull dematerialized before Conan's gaze - though to what destination, he would never know - while all about him the light began to fade and grow dim, until again he found himself in the dark, but this time alone.